The Underground Railroad eBook

HENRY BOX BROWN.

ARRIVED BY ADAMS’ EXPRESS.

Although the name of Henry Box Brown has been echoed
over the land for a number of years, and the simple
facts connected with his marvelous escape from slavery
in a box published widely through the medium of anti-slavery
papers, nevertheless it is not unreasonable to suppose
that very little is generally known in relation to
this case.

Briefly, the facts are these, which doubtless have
never before been fully published—­

Brown was a man of invention as well as a hero.
In point of interest, however, his case is no more
remarkable than many others. Indeed, neither
before nor after escaping did he suffer one-half what
many others have experienced.

He was decidedly an unhappy piece of property in the
city of Richmond, Va. In the condition of a slave
he felt that it would be impossible for him to remain.
Full well did he know, however, that it was no holiday
task to escape the vigilance of Virginia slave-hunters,
or the wrath of an enraged master for committing the
unpardonable sin of attempting to escape to a land
of liberty. So Brown counted well the cost before
venturing upon this hazardous undertaking. Ordinary
modes of travel he concluded might prove disastrous
to his hopes; he, therefore, hit upon a new invention
altogether, which was to have himself boxed up and
forwarded to Philadelphia direct by express. The
size of the box and how it was to be made to fit him
most comfortably, was of his own ordering. Two
feet eight inches deep, two feet wide, and three feet
long were the exact dimensions of the box, lined with
baize. His resources with regard to food and
water consisted of the following: One bladder
of water and a few small biscuits. His mechanical
implement to meet the death-struggle for fresh air,
all told, was one large gimlet. Satisfied that
it would be far better to peril his life for freedom
in this way than to remain under the galling yoke
of Slavery, he entered his box, which was safely nailed
up and hooped with five hickory hoops, and was then
addressed by his next friend, James A. Smith, a shoe
dealer, to Wm. H. Johnson, Arch street, Philadelphia,
marked, “This side up with care.”
In this condition he was sent to Adams’ Express
office in a dray, and thence by overland express to
Philadelphia. It was twenty-six hours from the
time he left Richmond until his arrival in the City
of Brotherly Love. The notice, “This side
up, &c.,” did not avail with the different expressmen,
who hesitated not to handle the box in the usual rough
manner common to this class of men. For a while
they actually had the box upside down, and had him
on his head for miles. A few days before he was
expected, certain intimation was conveyed to a member
of the Vigilance Committee that a box might be expected
by the three o’clock morning train from the
South, which might contain a man. One of the most